<p>Finance Minister Nirmala Sitharaman on Tuesday slammed the World Inequality Report terming India as 'poor and very unequal country', She said it was flawed and based on questionable methodology.</p>.<p>Sitharaman was replying to the discussion on the Finance Bill, 2022, and Appropriation Bill 2022 in Rajya Sabha.</p>.<p>A recent report by an internation agency claimed that inequality and poverty figures had worsened in India. Noting that Covid-19 may have begun as a health crisis but has become an economic one now, Oxfam India in its inequality report at Davos Agenda summit said the wealthiest 10 per cent have amassed 45 per cent of the national wealth while the share of the bottom 50 per cent of the population is a mere 6 per cent.</p>.<p>On wealth inequality, Oxfam report further said that 142 Indian billionaires collectively own wealth of $719 billion (over Rs 53 lakh crore), while the richest 98 of them now have the same wealth as the poorest 55.5 crore people in the bottom 40 per cent ($657 billion or nearly Rs 49 lakh crore).</p>.<p>If each of the 10 richest Indian billionaires were to spend $one million daily, it would take them 84 years to exhaust their current wealth, while an annual wealth tax applied to multi-millionaires and billionaires would raise $78.3 billion a year that would be enough to increase government health budget by 271 per cent or eliminate households' out-of-pocket health budget and leave some $30.5 billion, the report had said.</p>.<p><em><strong>Check out the latest DH videos here:</strong></em></p>
<p>Finance Minister Nirmala Sitharaman on Tuesday slammed the World Inequality Report terming India as 'poor and very unequal country', She said it was flawed and based on questionable methodology.</p>.<p>Sitharaman was replying to the discussion on the Finance Bill, 2022, and Appropriation Bill 2022 in Rajya Sabha.</p>.<p>A recent report by an internation agency claimed that inequality and poverty figures had worsened in India. Noting that Covid-19 may have begun as a health crisis but has become an economic one now, Oxfam India in its inequality report at Davos Agenda summit said the wealthiest 10 per cent have amassed 45 per cent of the national wealth while the share of the bottom 50 per cent of the population is a mere 6 per cent.</p>.<p>On wealth inequality, Oxfam report further said that 142 Indian billionaires collectively own wealth of $719 billion (over Rs 53 lakh crore), while the richest 98 of them now have the same wealth as the poorest 55.5 crore people in the bottom 40 per cent ($657 billion or nearly Rs 49 lakh crore).</p>.<p>If each of the 10 richest Indian billionaires were to spend $one million daily, it would take them 84 years to exhaust their current wealth, while an annual wealth tax applied to multi-millionaires and billionaires would raise $78.3 billion a year that would be enough to increase government health budget by 271 per cent or eliminate households' out-of-pocket health budget and leave some $30.5 billion, the report had said.</p>.<p><em><strong>Check out the latest DH videos here:</strong></em></p>
